Star Wars: The Force Awakens is still many months away, so why not tide yourself over with a smart sci-fi movie featuring not one, but two new Star Wars cast members? Ex Machina stars Oscar Isaac and Domhnall Gleeson as a reclusive CEO and a young programmer, respectively, with Alicia Vikander as Ava, a new AI model that may be too real for either man to handle. Buzz has been building for the film since its January premiere in the U.K. and word has been overwhelmingly positive. Ex Machina opens in Chicago on April 17, but The A.V. Club and A24 have an opportunity for you to see it for free, a day early, on April 16. For your chance to win a pair of passes, follow the link here and enter your information. As always, seats will be first come, first served, so be sure to arrive early. An official plot synopsis and trailer can be found below.
“Alex Garland, writer of 28 Days Later and Sunshine, makes his directorial debut with the stylish and cerebral thriller, Ex Machina. Caleb Smith (Domhnall Gleeson), a programmer at an internet-search giant, wins a competition to spend a week at the private mountain estate of the company’s brilliant and reclusive CEO, Nathan Bateman (Oscar Isaac). Upon his arrival, Caleb learns that Nathan has chosen him to be the human component in a Turing Test—charging him with evaluating the capabilities, and ultimately the consciousness, of Nathan’s latest experiment in artificial intelligence. That experiment is Ava (Alicia Vikander), a breathtaking A.I. whose emotional intelligence proves more sophisticated––and more deceptive––than the two men could have imagined.”